“And before that, you had no idea?”
“No, I really didn’t,” said Clary, recalling the moment. “Izzy… if you have feelings for Simon, or if you want to know if he has feelings for you… maybe you should just tell him.”
Isabelle fiddled with some nonexistent lint on her cuff. “Tell him what?”
“How you feel about him.”
Isabelle looked mutinous. “I shouldn’t have to.”
Clary shook her head. “God. You and Alec, you’re so alike—”
Isabelle’s eyes widened. “We are not! We are totally not alike. I date around; he’s never dated before Magnus. He gets jealous; I don’t—”
“Everyone gets jealous.” Clary spoke with finality. “And you’re both so stoic. It’s love, not the Battle of Thermopylae. You don’t have to treat everything like it’s a last stand. You don’t have to keep everything inside.”
Isabelle threw her hands up. “Suddenly you’re an expert?”
“I’m not an expert,” Clary said. “But I do know Simon. If you don’t say something to him, he’s going to assume it’s because you’re not interested, and he’ll give up. He needs you, Iz, and you need him. He just also needs you to be the one to say it.”
Isabelle sighed and whirled to begin mounting the steps. Clary could hear her muttering as she went. “This is your fault, you know. If you hadn’t broken his heart—”
“Isabelle!”
“Well, you did.”
“Yeah, and I seem to remember that when he got turned into a rat, you were the one who suggested we leave him in rat form. Permanently.”
“I did not.”
“You did—” Clary broke off. They had reached the next floor, where a long corridor stretched in both directions. Before the double doors of the infirmary stood the parchment-robed figure of a Silent Brother, hands folded, face cast down in a meditative stance.
Isabelle indicated him with an exaggerated wave. “There you go,” she said. “Good luck getting past him to see Jace.” And she walked off down the corridor, her boots clicking on the wooden floor.
Clary sighed inwardly and reached for the stele in her belt. She doubted there was a glamour rune that could fool a Silent Brother, but perhaps, if she could get close enough to use a sleep rune on his skin…
Clary Fray. The voice in her head was amused, and also familiar. It had no sound, but she recognized the shape of the thoughts, the way you might recognize the way someone laughed or breathed.
“Brother Zachariah.” Resignedly she slid the stele back in place and moved closer to him, wishing Isabelle had stayed with her.
I presume you are here to see Jonathan, he said, lifting his head from the meditative stance. His face was still in shadow beneath the hood, though she could see the shape of an angular cheekbone. Despite the orders of the Brotherhood.
“Please call him Jace. It’s too confusing otherwise.”
‘Jonathan’ is a fine old Shadowhunter name, the first of names. The Herondales have always kept names in the family—
“He wasn’t named by a Herondale,” Clary pointed out. “Though he has a dagger of his father’s. It says S.W.H. on the blade.”
Stephen William Herondale.
Clary took another step toward the doors, and toward Zachariah. “You know a lot about the Herondales,” she said. “And of all the Silent Brothers, you seem the most human. Most of them never show any emotion. They’re like statues. But you seem to feel things. You remember your life.”
Being a Silent Brother is life, Clary Fray. But if you mean I remember my life before the Brotherhood, I do.
Clary took a deep breath. “Were you ever in love? Before the Brotherhood? Was there ever anyone you would have died for?”
There was a long silence. Then:
Two people, said Brother Zachariah. There are memories that time does not erase, Clarissa. Ask your friend Magnus Bane, if you do not believe me. Forever does not make loss forgettable, only bearable.
“Well, I don’t have forever,” said Clary in a small voice. “Please let me in to see Jace.”
Brother Zachariah did not move. She still could not see his face, only a suggestion of shadows and planes beneath the hood of his robe. Only his hands, clasped in front of him.
“Please,” Clary said.
Alec swung himself up onto the platform at the City Hall subway station and stalked toward the stairs. He had blocked out the image of Magnus walking away from him with one thought, and one only:
He was going to kill Camille Belcourt.
City of Lost Souls
Cassandra Clare's books
- City of Ruins
- Invincible (A Centennial City Novel)
- City of Fae
- City of Heavenly Fire
- CITY OF GLASS
- City of Fallen Angels
- CITY OF BONES
- CITY OF ASHES
- City of Lost Souls
- Velocity
- Ascendancy of the Last
- Blood of Aenarion
- Broods Of Fenrir
- Burden of the Soul
- Caradoc of the North Wind
- Cause of Death: Unnatural
- Dark of the Moon
- Demons of Bourbon Street
- Edge of Dawn
- Eye of the Oracle
- Freak of Nature
- Heart of the Demon
- Lady of Devices
- Lance of Earth and Sky
- Last of the Wilds
- Legacy of Blood
- Legend of Witchtrot Road
- Lord of the Wolfyn
- Of Gods and Elves
- Of Wings and Wolves
- Prince of Spies
- Professor Gargoyle
- Promise of Blood
- Secrets of the Fire Sea
- Shadows of the Redwood
- Sin of Fury
- Sins of the Father
- Smugglers of Gor
- Sword of Caledor
- Sword of Darkness
- Talisman of El
- Threads of Desire (Spellcraft)
- Tricks of the Trade
- Visions of Magic
- Visions of Skyfire
- Well of the Damned
- Wings of Tavea
- Wings of the Wicked
- A Bridge of Years
- Chronicles of Raan
- Dawn of Swords(The Breaking World)
- A Draw of Kings
- Hunt the Darkness (Guardians of Eternity)
- Lord of the Hunt
- Master of War
- Mistfall(Book One of the Mistfall Series)
- The Gates of Byzantium
- The House of Yeel
- The Oath of the Vayuputras: Shiva Trilogy 3
- The Republic of Thieves #1
- The Republic of Thieves #2
- Edge of Dawn
- A Quest of Heroes
- Mistress of the Empire
- Servant of the Empire
- Gates of Rapture
- Reaper (End of Days)
- This Side of the Grave
- Magician's Gambit (Book Three of The Belgariad)
- Skin Game: A Novel of the Dresden Files
- Murder of Crows
- The Queen of the Tearling
- A Tale of Two Castles
- Mark of the Demon
- Sins of the Demon
- Blood of the Demon
- The Other Side of Midnight
- Vengeance of the Demon: Demon Novels, Book Seven (Kara Gillian 7)
- Cold Burn of Magic
- Of Noble Family
- Wrath of a Mad God ( The Darkwar, Book 3)
- King of Foxes
- Daughter of the Empire
- Mistress of the Empire
- Krondor : Tear of the Gods (Riftwar Legacy Book 3)
- Shards of a Broken Crown (Serpentwar Book 4)
- Rise of a Merchant Prince
- End of Days (Penryn and the End of Day #3)
- Servant of the Empire
- Talon of the Silver Hawk
- Shadow of a Dark Queen
- The Cost of All Things
- The Wicked (A Novella of the Elder Races)
- Night's Honor (A Novel of the Elder Races Book 7)
- Born of Silence
- Born of Shadows
- Sins of the Night
- Kiss of the Night (Dark Hunter Series – Book 7)
- Born Of The Night (The League Series Book 1)